1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to a device for attachment to the top of the bottle to provide protection against injury to teeth when drinking from the bottle. The present invention also relates to a bottle enclosure device for attachment to the top of the bottle to provide protection against injury to teeth when drinking from the bottle after the bottle top enclosure is opened.
2. Description of the Prior Art
It is a well-known fact that drinking a beverage from a glass bottle (or bottle made of other hard material, such as metal, hard plastic or high stiffness material), implicates the risk of damage to the teeth of the person consuming the beverage. Such damage may, for example, range from relatively minor chipping of the tooth which requires restoration to more pronounced damage which requires tooth replacement. The risk of tooth damage from drinking from a glass bottle is heightened when it is done in a public location such as a bar or sporting event and particularly when the beverage being consumed is an alcoholic beverage.
As presently exists, the conventional crimped cap or twist off cap is used to contain the contents inside a bottle, whereas upon removal of the crimped cap to consume a bottle's contents the consumer is exposed to a glass, or otherwise hard surface of which when in contact with a consumer's mouth may cause dental damages.
U.S. Pat. No. 2,317,046 (Fleming) relates to a sanitary drinking cap for 'bottles and the like, and has for one of its objects the production of a simple and efficient cap which may be easily attached to the mouth of a bottle to facilitate drinking from a bottle, and at the same time shield the lips of the user so that the end of the bottle neck will be prevented from contacting with the lips of the user. A further object of Fleming is the production of a simple and efficient sanitary drinking cap having an inserting neck for fitting within the neck of a bottle and an overhanging or encasing flange for encasing the outer bead of the neck of a bottle to provide a sanitary shield for the bottle neck while drinking, the inner neck and outer bead providing a brace for firmly holding the drinking cap upon a bottle. Fleming expressly teaches that attached to the top portion of the bottle protector is a drinking spout which extends outwardly at different heights from the top (outer wall) of the protector. Similarly, U.S. Pat. No. 2,678,142 (Creed) discloses a removable mouthpiece or spout for a bottle, where like with Fleming, there is a trough-like tongue (spout) structure extending outwardly at different heights from the top (outer wall) of the mouthpiece. However, it is desired to have a tooth protector device that does not have such outwardly-extending structure.
No device has heretofore been available to protect a person's teeth when he/she is drinking from a glass bottle, nor has a bottle top enclosure been provided that provides the feature of protecting a person's teeth when drinking from the opened bottle where the bottle top enclosure, when opened, does not have outwardly-extending structure. This new and useful result has been obtained by the tooth protectors and bottle top enclosures of the present invention.